Do you struggle to score against the Hedgehog and find it difficult to break the Black fortress? This opening manual, which could double as a positional middlegame manual, will show you how White can use a space advantage in this chess opening with maximum results.
The Hedgehog System, a personal favourite of many club players, is important to understand for all White players as the positions are near-universal. They can arise from the English Opening, the Nimzo-Indian and Queen’s Indian Defences and the Sicilian Opening. The Hedgehog is a flexible defence as Black can undermine your centre with …b6-b5 or …d6-d5. Black can attack your kingside dark squares with a queen-and-bishop battery or go after your king by launching the g-pawn.
That’s why Beating The Hedgehog System focuses on the most airtight variations, taking the sting out of Black’s counterplay and making White’s space advantage count. You will learn the general strategies but also essential features such as:
– how to get the ideal queenside formation versus the Hedgehog
– how to use x-rays and little tactics to stop Black’s …d6-d5 break
– how to provoke Black’s e-pawn to move to e5
– when to push your a-pawn to the fourth rank… and when to hold it back
Included are fifteen model games and thirty strategy and tactics exercises to fine-tune your feel for this Opening. This book has been adapted from the MoveTrainer® and video Chessable course with the same name.
Hanna Ivan-Gal is a top-100 player in Hungary, Woman FIDE Master and an experienced coach. She is also the presenter of the Hedgehog video course on Chessable.
Laszlo Hazai from Hungary is an International Master, a lifetime FIDE Senior Trainer, a former coach of the Polgar sisters, and a distinguished opening theoretician who wrote dozens of Opening Surveys for New In Chess Yearbook.
The Sicilian Sveshnikov arises after the opening moves 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e5, and is an ideal weapon based on sound principles of fast development and seizing central space. Decades of practical testing and analysis have proved the theoretical soundness of Black’s system, and its dynamic counterattacking potential makes it a popular choice among club players and top grandmasters alike.
Serbian grandmaster Milos Pavlovic is a lifelong Sveshnikov player as well as an experienced chess trainer, making him the ideal guide to this opening. Playing the Sveshnikov offers a complete repertoire for Black in the Sveshnikov, including secondary recommendations against certain key variations. With top-class analysis, novelties galore and thoughtful explanations, this book provides everything you need to learn and play the Sveshnikov with success.
Milos Pavlovic is a former Yugoslav Champion who has held the grandmaster title since 1993. An experienced tournament competitor, theoretician and FIDE Trainer, he is an expert on the Sveshnikov, having played both sides of it for most of his chess career.
Building and maintaining an opening repertoire can be a demanding task – for a start there are an enormous number of different lines to choose from. There's a strong temptation amongst beginners and improving players to opt solely for tricky lines in order to snare unsuspecting opponents, but this approach has only short-term value. As you improve and your opponents become stronger, very often these crafty lines don't stand up to close scrutiny, and suddenly you're back to square one with no suitable opening weapons.
In Starting Out: 1 d4! John Cox solves this perennial problem by providing the reader with a strong and trustworthy repertoire with the white pieces based on the popular opening move 1.d4. The recommended lines given here have stood the test of time and are regularly employed by Grandmasters. Reading this book will give you the confidence to play these variations against all strengths of player and provide you with a reliable opening armoury for years to come.
This book is written in Everyman Chess's distinctive Starting Out style, with plenty of notes, tips and warnings throughout to help the aspiring player.
In Starting Out: 1 e4! Neil McDonald solves this perennial problem by providing the reader with a strong and trustworthy repertoire with the white pieces based on the popular opening move 1.e4. The recommended lines given here have stood the test of time and are regularly employed by Grandmasters. Reading this book will give you the confidence to play these variations against all strengths of player and provide you with reliable opening armoury for years to come.
Throw Down the Gauntlet from the Very First Move!
The Modern Defense has been popular for decades. However, within the purview of this defense, there is a system that challenges White right from the get-go. The brainchild of Georgian grandmaster Bukhuti Gurgenidze, Black plays 1...g6 and follows with a timely ...c6 and ...d5. Occasionally classified as part of the Caro-Kann, it draws battle lines immediately.
The move 1...g6 in general is an aggressive approach, throwing down the gauntlet from the very first move. This is why in some lines, even if the reader finds that the engine assesses a position in White’s favor, one should not be put off.
This book, the first one dedicated to the Modern Gurgenidze in many years, consists of 10 theoretical Chapters and 31 sample games. Jaan carefully explains how Black’s plans may change depending on White’s move order, when exactly we should play ...c7-c6 followed by ...d7-d5 (Chapters 1-5) and when we would be better off with ...d7-d6 and ...e7-e5 (Chapters 6-10). You will be treated to Jaan’s insights on Hippo, Dutch, English, King’s Indian and even 1.b3, all through the eyes of Gurgenidze system. – Grandmaster Alex Shabalov in his Foreword.
The Modern Gurgenidze has figured prominently in Jaan Ehlvest’s repertoire as Black for many years. He now shares his expertise and experience in this provocative defense. If you want to play for a draw, this book is not for you. But if you want to play for the full point, this counterpunching defense may be just what you are looking for.
About the Author: Jaan Ehlvest is a grandmaster from Tallinn, Estonia. He won the 1980 USSR Junior Chess Championship when he was 18 and in 1983, the European Junior Championship. He was champion of Estonia in 1986 and was a member of the gold medal-winning Soviet Union team at the 28th Chess Olympiad in Thessaloniki 1988. He played for Estonia in the Chess Olympiads of 1992-2004. This is his first book for Russell Enterprises.
The Slav (1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6) is a great choice against 1.d4 for players who are after a solid position from the opening but one that also contains dynamic possibilities. The pawn on c6 guarantees Black a firm foothold in the centre but there is also the ever-present possibility to capture on c4 and possibly even try to hold on to this pawn. The Slav is ideal for combining reliability with a promise for dynamic counterplay in the middlegame.
In Opening Repertoire: The Slav, highly experienced chess author and coach Cyrus Lakdawala guides the reader through the complexities of the Slav and carves out a repertoire for Black. He examines all aspects of this highly complex opening and provides the reader with well-researched, fresh, and innovative analysis. Each annotated game has valuable lessons on how to play the opening and contains instructive commentary on typical middlegame plans.
The Grand Prix Attack is one of White's most aggressive ways of fighting the Sicilian. It leads to a sharp, complex battle in which White often launches a direct attack against the black king. The opening has become a powerful weapon in the cut and thrust of tournament chess, where victory is everything and draws are not enough. It has even gained the seal of approval from elite players such as Vishy Anand and Nigel Short, who have both utilized it with success.
In this book Gawain Jones, one of the world' leading experts on the Grand Prix Attack, provides everything you need to know about this opening. Using illustrative games and drawing upon his own wealth of experience, he introduces the key moves and ideas for both sides, taking care to explain the reasoning behind them - something that has often been neglected or taken for granted.
The Everyman Chess Starting Out series has firmly established itself as the leading guide to studying openings for up-and-coming players. These books are distinguished by their easy-to-read layout, the lucid explanations of the fundamentals, and the abundance of notes, tips and warnings to help the reader absorb vital ideas.
“There can be no Plan B because there is no Planet B,” said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. We disagree when it comes to chess. In this book you will see analyzed not only 1.d4 b5 (the Polish Defense) but also the St. George Defense (1.e4 e6 2.d4 a6 intending 3...b5), 1.Nf3 b5, also 1.f4 b5 and, most shocking of all, 1.e4 a6 2.d4 b5. Grandmasters have lost to these systems; other Grandmasters even try them out themselves when they have the black pieces. No, an early ...b7-b5 is not Plan A. However, if you want to humiliate the opposition by being literally eccentric (off-center) and disrespectful ... Welcome to Planet B!
After studying this book, I feel that you should be comfortable using the Polish Defense in your games; it will boost your creativity and will allow you to notch unexpected victories... Although the Polish may not be ideal as a full-time weapon, its version of unorthodoxy will embarrass your opponents, especially if you are well-armed to endure the opening phase. The present work ensures that this is accomplished and gives you valuable tips for the middlegame as well. – Grandmaster Vassilios Kotronias in his Foreword
At the end of each chapter, there are fully annotated illustrative games, and at the very end of the book over a hundred unannotated games from recent practice have been added. In many respects, these represent the most important part of the book. These examples show what human players actually play and just how effective this underrated defense is.
When you are ready for a great fighting game in the Sicilian Defense, there are few things there are more annoying than facing the hatefully solid 2.c3 variation, the so-called Alapin Variation.
This is not a shady gambit but it is a weapon that has been used by several grandmasters, including World Champion Magnus Carlsen.
The gambit has the advantage of being unexplored and is still quite unknown. Therefore, this book constitutes the first work dedicated to this fun and tricky variation.
To get a good feel for the intricacies of the various lines, the authors took it upon themselves to play the opening in their online and training games where it proved remarkably effective.
In this work, you will find forty-four thoroughly analyzed main games with lots of explanations and additional analysis as well as a 'Quick Repertoire' that will allow you to play the opening in your games after a minimal amount of study time.
It is time to take your opponents out of their comfort zone and right into yours!
The ambition of many chess players at various levels is to build a full and reliable repertoire against White’s major starting moves. This book is designed to provide exactly that: a complete list of variations needed to know in order to confidently meet 1.d4. The goal is to lift the burden of line selection and research off your shoulders and show you exactly what you need to know to get out of the 1.d4 openings at least equal with the black pieces.
I base the repertoire on the Nimzo-Indian and Bogo-Indian Defenses. The spirit of Indian Defenses is based on flexibility and harmony. As you will notice during the course of reading the book, the lines recommended here rarely end with huge imbalances or clear weaknesses for Black. Quite often White will get the bishop pair but will have to suffer pawn weaknesses or Black’s greater piece activity in return.
Most of the lines are positional, not tactical in character. That means that stepping out of the path outlined in the book should not get you in too much trouble, as long as your moves have solid positional foundations. While playing Black, you have to accept that occasionally you will not equalize, or get surprised or out-prepared. Learning the material from this book should sharply limit the extent of such instances, thus improving your overall results.
Finally, I have an important piece of advice: remember about color strategy! The Bogo-Indian is mainly based on dark-squared control, while the Nimzo-Indian does so on the light squares. In case you forget what to do, this may prove a very useful guideline when choosing a move.
I wish you pleasant reading and great results against 1.d4!
Muchos años han pasado desde que en 1914 Nimzowitch desarrollara e introdujera a nivel magistral la Defensa Nimzoindia.
Como uno de los padres de la corriente Hipermoderna de pensamiento ajedrecístico, Nimzowitch se dio cuenta del enorme potencial que tenía la idea del control del centro con piezas en lugar de la forma tradicional con peones. De esa manera se podía dejar la estructura flexible para posteriormente situarla como más conveniese. A pesar de las críticas de algunos de sus coetáneos como Tarrasch, Nimzowitch siguió su propio camino desarrollando ideas que hoy forman parte del arsenal habitual de los jugadores de Nimzo, nombre coloquial que le damos a la Nimzoindia, como la creación del complejo de peones doblados en c y posterior ataque a c4 o el juego de bloqueo de la estructura enemiga con d6-e5.
Hoy se puede decir que el tiempo le ha dado la razón en la corrección de sus ideas y su defensa es una de las que mejores estadísticas consigue, siendo un arma habitual de los jugadores de élite.
The O’Kelly is the 5th most popular response to 2.Nf3 in the Sicilian. It is a sound weapon and still contains a lot of surprise value. You will notice this in the time White generally takes for his third move when you play on one of the internet platforms. With some general knowledge about the Sicilian Defence and good theoretical preparation, built on the basis of the lines presented in this book, you will have an excellent starting point to obtain good results in this intriguing chess opening.